MalenkayaCherepakha

It's been a long time, huh? 

Life has been ridiculously busy, but things are finally settling into something resembling calm, so I thought it was about time I popped in and said hi, caught up. So hi! How has everyone been? 

I've been super busy, as I said. Earlier this summer we moved halfway across the country, so the past six months or so have been full of job hunting, house hunting, PhD finishing (for my partner, not me), and the actual process of moving. But now we've been in our new house and new jobs for a couple of months, and things are finally starting to settle down. 

It's weird living somewhere new - we'd lived in our old town for nearly 9 years, our old house for nearly 5, and I'd been working at the same place for all those years too, but I think we've landed on our feet. New house is nice, new job is challenging and has lots of nice people, so it's all good stuff. We don't really know anyone here yet, so social stuff is a bit lacking, but that'll come with time. I need to find myself some sociable hobbies - too many of mine are do at home on your own type of hobbies!

I've been reading a lot, although admittedly plenty of rereading (gotta reread the comfort books when life is stressful) and I've been slowly tapping away at my original work. It's been slow going, but the pace is picking up now that I'm less busy and/or exhausted, and I hit the 20k mark recently which I'm super happy about. I've hit some plot snags which I'm hoping to sort out this week so I'm not expecting lots of words this week, but it needs sorting before I can progress much further. 

I can't wait to get it to the point where someone else can read it, even if it isn't fully finished and polished. It's been the biggest difference for me from writing fic. I never wrote particularly long fic, so I was getting feedback, either from betas or readers, pretty regularly, so it's been a lesson in patience working on something longer without that constant drip of feedback (and validation!). I have days where I think it must be complete rubbish, and it's hard not having that reassurance that no, this is good, keep going, but I'm trying to trust the process. Either way, I'll come out of it having written a book, which is a hell of an achievement.

I've set a tentative goal of finishing the first draft by the time my birthday comes around in January, so wish me luck! 

What are you all working on? What have I missed? Fill me in!

Well, it's been a while, hasn't it? I hope everyone's doing well. 

I'm finally back writing, which is great, and I'm taking on a new challenge - writing something original!

I've had the idea in my head for ages, had twisted it to make it work as a Harry/Draco fic, but since I've taken a step back from fandom, I've decided that nope, lets write the idea I originally had, not one that's forced into a shape it doesn't really want to take. 

It's still very, very early days, but I figure if I quietly say here that I'm doing it, it might keep me motivated enough to finish it, give me that accountability and slight bit of pressure I need, which I used to get from fandom friends or fest deadlines.

I'm enjoying myself though. It's already very different to writing fic - I put off starting for ages because I had the plot but not the characters, not really a problem you get with fic. They still don't have names, but I'm sure the right names will come to me at some point. It's weird not having the built in community that comes with fic, this truly feels like a solo project, but I'm also finding that I'm feeling a lot less pressure as a result. I don't have to worry about how it will be received, whether I'm fitting in to popular tropes/characterisations etc etc. I can just write the story that's in my head, just for the pleasure of writing.

But, having a community around does help in some ways, so I'll take this opportunity to ask you all for your thoughts. To give a (very very) brief background to put my questions into context, the story is a modern day MM sports romance, between two opposing players turned teammates, told in alternating POV. 


SO. Which do you prefer?

1st person vs 3rd person POV

Present tense vs past tense


I've started writing it one way (not going to tell you which ;) ) but I'm not convinced, so I'm intrigued which most people prefer (and reasons why, if you're so inclined, but you don't have to!).

Reveals have posted at hd-hurtfest and I’m so excited to claim my fic! I loved writing this one - thank you to everyone who gave it a chance and read it <3 

I highly recommend checking out the rest of the entries - there were so many great ones, and such a variety of pairings. 

Another month gone, and as Isabelle kindly reminded me on Animal Crossing the other day, we are now halfway through the year. This was a hard month, I'm not really sure why, and I struggled to get much written, but I did achieve some stuff. 

June Goals:

• Long non fest fic: I did pretty much nothing on this, got very distracted by other things, but as I mentioned in my goal post, I'm not looking to post this until 2021 so no real time pressure. 

• Cross Gen fic: submitted this! It might be the earliest I've ever submitted a fest fic haha

• HurtFest fic: So I had an idea for a fic, and decided not to write it because it was going to be long, but then I looked at the full prompt list, and, shockingly, I've claimed a prompt. I saw the prompt and had an outline within an hour, so I couldn't not claim, right?!

July Goals:

• Hurt Fest fic: This is my main focus for the month. I'd love to get at least the first draft fully written before the end of the month, and hopefully be relatively close to finished with it. I've got a fair chunk written already, although I'm debating whether I need to go back through it all and change the tense, so that'll be fun if I end up doing it. I'm optimistic that this goal is doable, if I try!

• Daily Deviant: I need to write my entry for this month. I've got the idea and pairing, just need to sit down and actually write it.

• HP Inspired By: Depending on how I'm doing for time I might chuck a submission in the fest, although we've got good numbers so it's not the end of the world if I don't get something written. 

• Keep going with reading and reccing as much as possible.

I'm hoping to sign up for Erised (if I can be quick enough!), and I'd also like to write something for Next Gen Fest, which is why I'm so keen to get as much of HurtFest written as possible this month. I want to have a relatively clear plate so I can devote myself to those fests! 

It feels like fest season is making a tentative start, and I'm getting fest envy already. This does not bode well.

I'm keen to do Cross Gen - I know which pairing I want to write, and I have an idea that I'll use if no prompts grab me, and I have a couple more to prompt for other people. 

I promised I wasn't going to do any Drarry fests, but god I'm tempted already. I love the theme for Fan Fair this year, and Hurt Fest sounds so good. I even have an idea for a potential fic...

And the Erised chatter has started already, and despite saying I wasn't going to do it again, I'm very intrigued to see how different it is as a regular participant rather than a pinch hitter. 

We'll see. A lot depends on the prompt lists, but I don't want to get completely sucked into fest season and stop work on my WIP. 

Also, should probably be a good mod and say: HP Inspired By is still open for claiming! Fics don't have to be smutty and you can self prompt too if nothing takes your fancy. I'm shocked but very pleased at the take up we've had so far, here's hoping for some great works! 


I've also managed to make a good start on my WIP, and it feels good to be getting stuck into it. The first draft of chapter 1 is done, and chapter 2 is about halfway through. It's early stages of course, and there's lots of writing and editing to be done, but I'm really enjoying the process so far. 

I thought I'd end on a question that my WIP has got me thinking about -- at what point in a long fic do you get another set of eyes on it? 

I'm changing up a bunch of stuff about the way I write when it comes to my new project, and one of the biggest is that I've shifted from writing in GDocs to OneNote. I think it was Quicksilvermaid who said they use it, and it got me intrigued.

So far, I'm loving it. I really love the way you can have different tabs in the notebook, which is proving really useful as I'm putting more effort into planning this fic than normal. I've got tabs for details about each character (no more forgetting those little details about who's taller!) and each location, as well as the main outline and then of course each chapter has its own tab. I can already tell it's going to be a lot easier to refer back to previous chapters or notes than it would be if I had to flick through multiple gdocs to find what I'm looking for. It sounds like it does some of what Scrivener does, but without me needing to pay for it. 

I've also found that so far at least, changing up my routine has made it easier for me to write. Maybe it's just because I'm excited about the story, but I'm finding myself a lot more willing to write and make mistakes and then go back and fix them later. The ability to have two blocks of text next to each other in the same doc is really helping with that editing (I realise this probably makes zero sense without seeing it in action, I have no idea how to describe it better!) - yesterday I realised I needed to switch round the order of my opening, and I could do that side by side without needing two different docs or needing to immediately delete things I'd moved. 

We'll see if it keeps working well - I already know it's going to be annoying to have to keep updating separate gdocs for betas - but so far so good! Over the past few days I've managed to get the main relationship outlined, a whole bunch of plot ideas noted down, and the first 2k of chapter one written, so fingers crossed that momentum keeps up. 

It's a bank holiday weekend here so I'm hoping to get a lot of words out in between a bit of sunbathing (if the weather cooperates anyway!). I hope you all have a lovely weekend too (and enjoy the long weekend if you have one!).

Another little update on life, writing and more.

( Life (inc Covid) )

( Writing )

( Reading )

I've just got home following a weekend away in Cornwall with my boyfriend, and wow, the break has helped so much in terms of rediscovering my motivation and enthusiasm for writing.

Before we went away I was feeling quite meh about my writing and was completely blocked on a couple of fics. This weekend has changed that entirely. One morning while my boyfriend surfed I wrote nearly 1k of my daily deviant fic which I was totally stuck on (by the way, if anyone fancies betaing some Harry x Pansy smut give me a shout!), another day I had a dream about my banging birthday fic which has given me the start of my plot, and I explored a load of Cornish villages and beaches which has really inspired me to get cracking on my long fic (set in a west country coastal village).

I also took a break from the Drarry discord which is still ongoing - I was sad to temporarily leave but it's done me a lot of good so far, so I'm not going to go back quite yet. My new little writing server is really delivering on the supportive community aspect which is brilliant. 

This is all to say, breaks are important! It's so easy to think that we have to power through, to keep trying to get the words out, but sometimes you just need to switch off and let things settle in your mind, and then the ideas and words might just start flooding back.

And seeing as images on Dreamwidth are still far beyond my capabilities, here's a link to a tumblr post with some photos from my weekend, along with a little bit about how they're inspiring my fic!